by Brendan Fischer — July 18, 2011 - 6:06am
As the first half of 2011 has
revealed, Wisconsin is not a moderate "purple" state, but a state
divided between staunchly "blue" progressives and righteous "red"
right-wingers. That rift is particularly apparent in legislative
conflicts over the criminal justice system,
a debate spurred by corporate interests represented in the American
Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and perpetuated by ALEC legislative
members, including Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker.
Wisconsin's history and public
policy reflects the red/blue divide. It is the state that gave birth to
the Republican Party, which supported slavery abolition, and the John Birch Society, which opposed the civil rights movement. In the first half of the 20th Century, the state elected bothprogressive hero Robert "Fighting Bob" LaFollette and right-wing extremist Joe McCarthy. It is the state that elected both former Senator Russ Feingold (D) and Representative Paul Ryan (R).
Wisconsin also produced Paul Weyrich, who in 1973 co-founded both the Heritage Foundation and
ALEC (and in subsequent years, Free Congress and Moral Majority).
Weyrich's ALEC, it seems, has been a factory for many of the state's
most recent right-wing policy initiatives.
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